Most people don't belong to the Labour Party. I don't. You probably don't, either. In fact, I don't belong to any political party. I just vote when the time comes, something, unfortunately that most people don't do. Sadly, they wake up the next day to find out that elections have consequences, that their not voting didn't actually stop the political process; Parliament; polticos, etc. roll on.
But that's another point.
From the "Politics Is Showbusiness For Ugly People" division comes TFC - Tories For Corbyn. How did this phenomenon come to be?
Well, one Labour MP - Jeremy Corbyn - from the Left of Labour - decides to run for leadership of the Labour Party. Labour is considered by those on the Centre Right (and maybe you, too) as dead in the water after losing the last General Election. And should stay dead.
By the way, here's that final vote toll: Conservatives - 11,334,576 to 9,347,304 for Labour. This gives the Cons (according to some of them) a "mandate". Under First Past The Post (FPTP) - the system that delivers majority government - their 2mill vote lead gives the Conservatives the most seats plus a teeny-tiny majority. But, hey, a winner is a winner and everyone loves a winner and nobody likes a loser. And Labour is a loser. For now.
Back to Corbyn.
So here's a guy who's been an MP of over 30 years standing; pretty consistent in what he believes in; and who decides to Do Something - i.e. stand for Leader of his Party.
This declaration unleashes a fire storm from our largely right-of-centre press - summertime, bored; its claws still sharp from the mauling it gave Labour in conjunction with the Cons, thereby delivering the most ad hominem/policy-light campaign I've seen for a long time. And I'm from Chicago.
Now at the height of summer, a cabal has emerged, emboldened by victory and the support of this centre-right press, (that's most of the newspapers actually) who call themselves the catchy: "Tories For Corbyn".
A varied group, theses TFC folks. They range from the wistful:
To something you might imagine to be a kind of " Pimms'o'clock" drinkies out there:
@LawnmowerThomas
Hmm - out for supper in Penge and have seen Comrade Corbyn looky likeys driving 194, at next table, at best table #ToriesForCorbyn
From those TFCs who just can't stay in the shadows (and why should they!!) but who must come forward boldly to announce:
@JamesWillby
We created the hashtag #SaveEd. We created #toriesforcorbyn....
To the bold and full-speed-ahead!
Now they may say that only the "wet"; the "loony" the "lefty" and the "lefttard" are whining. Yet you kinda have to admire that the teeny-tiny fact that most of us who voted didn't vote for the Tories doesn't really bother the TFC. They're righteous. "Tory-in-excelsis" and all is what really, really, REALLY matters.
Yes, the Conservatives are truly on a roll and this is the first: they're aided and abetted by essentially a digital wrecking-crew - i.e. trolls - with serious media connections.
Just about anyone who stands up them and the rest of the centre-right nomenklatura - well I, for one, have a degree of respect for.